Land mines are dangerous and claim the lives of thousands of soldiers or innocent civilians every year. Most land mines are detonated by a pressure-activated fuse. The pressure required to activate those fuses range from ounces to many pounds. Anti-personnel mines typically require one or so pounds to detonate. The overwhelming majority of anti-tank mines require several pounds of pressure to detonate.
A large worldwide community is dedicated to ridding the world of future and already emplaced land mines. Various governments and humanitarian efforts are developing land mine detection systems to pinpoint the locations of land mines so personnel and equipment can avoid the mines that might detonate and cause damage. All efforts including the day-to-day civilian activities in mined countries could benefit from mine-overpass-capabilities.
The countermine community typically assumes that low ground pressure vehicles automatically create a mine overpass capability. Low ground pressure vehicles could be lightweight vehicles with very wide air-filed tires, or lightweight vehicles with wide flat tracks like a lightweight bulldozer, or a hovercraft.
Low ground pressure does not automatically mean low mine pressure. Low mine fusing mechanism pressure is the problem to be solved. For pressure-fused mines, pressure on the mine's trip-mechanism causes it to detonate. A low ground pressure vehicle with a large contact patch on flat ground could have an extremely low ground pressure but a mine-fuse pressure that is half or all of its weight.
When a large stone, for example, is placed over a mine an entire soft-tire may be lifted from the ground so that a quarter of a vehicle's weight bears on the stone. When the tire is lifted, the stone transmits that entire force from one tire to the mine fuse.
Assume for a moment that a human weighs 200 pounds and has two feet in boots with extremely stiff soled shoes that are perfectly flat with 50 square inches that touch the ground. This human's pressure on the ground is about 4 pounds per square inch (200/50). If on the other hand the human steps on a partially buried mine with one foot as he or she is walking, the pressure on that mine's trip-mechanism could be as much as 200 pounds.
Needs exist for improved ground contact apparatus and methods to avoid triggering mines while moving in mined areas.